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  • Tribunal Sacks Melaye, Orders Fresh Elections

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) The National Assembly/State Assembly Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Lokoja on Friday sacked Senator Dino Melaye as the Senator for Kogi West.

    In its judgement, the tribunal ordered that fresh elections should be held in the senatorial district.

    The three man panel led by Justice A. O. Chijioke in a unanimous judgment on Friday accepted Adeyemi’s ground and order for reelection into the senatorial axis.

    Read more at: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2019/08/breaking-tribunal-sacks-dino-as-kogi-west-senator/

    Details later.

  • Internet Fraud: FBI Nabs More Nigerians In U.S.

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) Scores of Nigerians have been arrested in U.S. by the Federal Bureau of Intelligence (FBI) in a major conspiracy to steal millions of dollars through fraud schemes and launder the money through a Los Angeles-based network.

    The arrest comes few days after Forbes celebrated Nigerian young billionaire, Obinwanne Okeke popularly known as Invictus Obi was arrested over $12 million internet scam.

    Okeke, named by Forbes in 2016 as one of the world’s 30 Entrepreneurs under the age of 30 to watch, was accused of milking a branch of U.S. owned Caterpillar subsidiary in the UK of $11.5m, among other fraudulent acts committed.

    Authorities in the U.S. said on Thursday that 80 people have so far been indicted in the case which is believed to be the largest in U.S. history.

    According to a statement on the twitter handle of FBI Los Angeles, the conspiracy included frauds involving business email (BEC scams), romance scams and schemes targeting elderly people.

    Victims were targeted in the U.S. and around the world, and some lost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

    Fourteen defendants were arrested, mostly in the Los Angeles region. FBI agents could be seen processing suspects in a downtown Los Angeles parking lot.

    Six other defendants are believed to be fugitives in the U.S. and the others are abroad, mostly in Nigeria. Authorities said they hope to extradite them.

    The investigation began in 2016 with one victim and a single bank account, said Paul Delacourt, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles office.

    Among the people arrested are Valentine Iro, 31, of Carson, and Chukwudi Christogunus Igbokwe, 38, of Gardena, both Nigerian citizens.

    Others are: Jerry Ikogho, 50, of Carson (who was taken into custody on Sunday), and Adegoke Moses Ogungbe, 34, of Fontana, who were indicted as illicit money exchangers for the conspiracy.

    In addition, Iro, Igbokwe, Ikogho, Ogungbe and three other defendants –Izuchukwu Kingsley Umejesi, 30, of Los Angeles, Tityaye Marina Mansbangura, 33, of Palmdale, and Obi Madekwe, 31, of Nigeria – are charged with operating illegal money transmitting businesses.

    Ogungbe and Mansbangura were also among those arrested this morning, and Umejesi is a fugitive currently being sought by authorities.

    The FBI statement also stated that Iro, Igbokwe and Chuks Eroha, 39, face additional charges for attempting to destroy their phones when the FBI executed a search warrant in July 2017.

    Iro also is charged with lying to the FBI in an interview conducted during the search.

    The complaint alleges that, when the FBI arrived to conduct the court-authorized search at Iro’s apartment in Carson, Iro broke his phone in half, while Igbokwe and Eroha threw phones from a bedroom window of the apartment.

    While Iro claimed he previously had broken the phone during an argument with his wife, the complaint details how the FBI was able to determine that the phone was operational until seconds after the FBI knocked on Iro’s apartment door to execute the search warrant.

    Eroha is believed to have fled to Nigeria shortly after the FBI executed the warrant.

    Read FBI’s full statements below on its twitter handle @FBILosAngeles:

  • Women Directors in Indian cinema

    The New World of Women

    Culled from CriticUnion

    Among the virtual ‘flooding’ of the ocean of directors are names like Reema Kagti who is successfully striding across mainstream cinema in recent times, having debuted with the delightfully entertaining Honeymoon Travels Private Limited,  Meghna Gulzar whose output is far from prolific but significant all the same, Leena Yadav who began with a thud with Shabd but recently drew attention with her latest film Parched, Ashwini Iyer Tiwari who drew excellent reviews for the out-of-the-box film Neel Battey Sannata followed by Bareilly Ki Barfi this year, Zoya Akhtar who made a brilliant debut with Luck By Chance followed by the thumping hit Zindagi Na Miley Dobara, Farah Khan who refuses to leave the mainstream orbit never mind whether her films click or do not but finally met her happy ending with Om Shanti Om, Nandita Das whose first film Firaaq made a lot of noise at international film festivals is being followed with Manto, her biopic on the famous author Sadat Hasan Manto and Alankrita Srivastava who raised a hornet’s nest among the CBFC higher-ups with her maiden directorial film Lipstick Under My Burkha. Konkona Sharma made her directorial debut with Death in the Gunje with great promise of better things to come which she has done with a few short films. The directors of the “New Brigade” if we call them that are educated, trained and bold enough to step both into a territory dominated by men as well as explore radical issues within the gender question. Let us take a closer look.

     

    Nandita Das

     

    “The journey of making Firaaq gave me the opportunity to express my concerns and beliefs. It has been a cathartic experience. It has pushed my boundaries and helped me grow both professionally and personally. I chose an ensemble structure because in mass violence there are no individual heroes or villains. When thousands have suffered, the suffering of only one person cannot be glorified. I wanted to explore the conflicting and complex emotions of fear, anxiety, prejudice and ambivalence in human relationships during times of crisis.  The challenges for me lay in making a rooted and contextual film and yet garner a universal audience. I wanted to provide the necessary realism and the universality of emotions that would make people across cultures relate to it,” said Nandita Das, who evolved from being an actress across cultures and directors, about her rationale for making a film on such a sensitive issue.

    Firaaq is like a celluloid anthology that carves a niche in the minds of the audience for capturing and freezing in time, moving images of the anger and anguish of personal responses to the Gujarat catastrophe. A recurring motif through Firaaq is the uncertainty that dogs the Muslim identity. It is not a happy metaphor, but one cannot escape its reality. Firaaq scans the lives of a few people over 24 hours, one month after the Gujarat carnage took place in March 2002 taking away between 3000 and 5000 lives. It exposes the underbelly of a city on the verge of moral and physical collapse where, Hindu or Muslim, some minds and many bodies are damaged forever. A few look around to take stock of their bearings in this changed scenario of hate, danger and uncertainty to move ahead, come what may.

    In her second film Manto, she takes a big leap to excellence and international recognition what with the film having been screened at the Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section. Manto is based on a segment of the life of Saadat Hasan Manto, one of the most controversial writers who migrated to Pakistan and died at a relatively young age. Nawazuddin Siddique has firmly entrenched himself in the film in the title role of Manto.  “But he did a significant role in my first film Firaaq when no one knew him,” says, Das. She has given him a completely new look with a wavy haircut and period pair of glasses. Those who have watched the film, heap praises on it.

    Konkona Sen Sharma

    Aparna Sen’s daughter Konkona Sen Sharma is a brilliant actress. She stepped into films to become a director but found herself turning into an actor of no mean merit. It took her years to make her directorial debut with A Death in the Ganj. The director, on a nostalgic trip back to her childhood, revisits a small town called McCluskieganj where she would join her parents for brief holidays till they sold the house. The time-frame is seven days just before the New Year way back in 1979.

    The director structures the film opening with two young men with 1979 haircuts and jackets discussing without emotion how to pack a dead body in the dickey of their old Ambassador. The camera’s perspective is from inside the dickey as if the dead person is looking at them from below. The film closes with the two men inside the car driving away. ’

    A Death in the Ganj is lyrical in its portrayal of a small town distanced from the madding crowds, yet it conveys a palpable sense of imminence. It involves a constant sense of motion – emotional, psychological and at times, even physical that follows the track towards the unavoidable tragedy in the end. Take a bow Konkona, you have given us a niche film targeted at a niche audience, true; but you have not tried to shy away from your refusal to compromise and making a film that is entirely “out of the box”.

    Meghna Gulzar

    Born to two distinguished parents Gulzar and Raakhee, Meghna Gulzar has the cinema in her genes and has made a mark with her somewhat radical subjects. Her first film Filhaal (2002) explored the rather fragile issue of surrogate motherhood. Though it had reasonably good actors, it did not do well at the box office but established Meghna as a director who thinks and treats her films differently. Her short film Puranmasi (2007) a part of Dus Kahaniyan, was a touching story of an innocent mother’s tragedy for being misunderstood by her own daughter.

    Just Married (2007) was quite mainstream with some lovely songs but somehow, it failed to get the message of arranged marriage across and did not do well at the box office. Talvar(2015) had a political agenda. Though it was a professionally sophisticated and enriched with excellent acting, in essence, it appeared to be a planned strategy to whitewash the guilt of the parents of a teenaged girl who were imprisoned for having murdered their only child. This was based on a true story that was covered by the media extensively. Soon after the release of the film, the parents were released and cleared of the accusations of murder. The film was slickly made and shot inside an apartment with very little camera movement outdoors.

    Meghna’s most outstanding film is Raazi released recently to rave reviews and packed theatres. Packaged glamorously and mounted lavishly, Raazi is technically a finished product. But what enriches the audience is the story of the diabolic and strategic manipulation of a young girl to initiate her into espionage, brainwashing her with the dictum “motherland first and then yourself.” The realistic acting is mind-blowing especially when the young woman stands confused between her responsibility as a spy and her growing love for her unsuspecting husband. Even the marriage is a manipulation where the girl, based on a true story, is not even asked whether she would like to become a spy or not even by her own father!

  • California To Sue Trump Over New Migrant Children Detention Policy

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) Gov. Gavin Newsom says California will join other states in filing a new lawsuit as early as next week to block the Trump administration’s efforts to indefinitely detain immigrant minors and families with children.

    Newsom made this known in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

    “It’s an assault on the Flores decision,.

    “Clearly, I think it will be rejected by the courts, and the answer to your question is California will once again assert itself in the court of law,” the governor said of the administration’s new regulations.

    The Department of Homeland Security announced plans this week for new regulations that would roll back protections for migrant children.

    Trump officials are taking aim at the 1997 Flores settlement that set minimum standards of care for youths in U.S. custody.

    The government is generally prohibited from detaining children, who traveled to the U.S. alone or with their families for longer than 20 days.

    Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan blamed the Flores settlement for an influx of Central American families coming to the U.S. border and said that the administration’s new regulations would deter migration.

    President Donald Trump also inaccurately claimed that former President Barack Obama started separating immigrant families.

    The regulations, which federal officials expect to publish Friday, add to an ongoing battle over the Trump administration’s ability to hold migrant families and the conditions that immigrants endure in detention centers.

    “Seven young children have died since Trump was inaugurated as president, not one died over eight years under President Obama’s stewardship.

    “Family separations happen under this administration,” Newsom said during his interview with CNN.

    Nathan Click, a spokesman for the governor, declined to offer any additional information about the timing of the lawsuit or its contents.

    The office of Attorney General Xavier Becerra, whose attorneys represent the state in court, also declined to comment.

    As of last week, California had filed some 56 lawsuits against the Trump administration on a variety of issues, including health care, immigration and the environment.

  • Centre Tasks Education Minister Adamu On Steadfastness, Continuity

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) A Civil Society Organisation (CSO), Centre for Peace, Transparency and Accountability has urged the reappointed Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, to justify his reappointment by remaining steadfast in the reforms he initiated in the nation’s education sector.

    The Centre in a statement signed by its Executive Director, Ogheneyero Patrick and made available to newsmen in Abuja on Thursday explained that the call became imperative considering the fact that Adamu performed creditably well in his first coming.

    “The Nigerian education sector witnessed a leap in your first term as Minister. Under your watch corruption in the sector was fought head-on in your quest to providing unfettered access to quality education within limited resources.

    “Our tertiary institutions were supervised effectively and its loss glory, high level manpower training and provision of quality library services, infrastructural development among others, are gradually returning.

    “Your coming back is a testimony that the President Buhari is determined to see the actualisation of the Ministerial Strategic Plan 2019-2023 for the education sector to continue to take its rightful place as a springboard for national development.

    “We as civil society organisation cannot accept less than what you offered in your first term; we have unwavering confidence in you, and one of the ways you can keep up the tempo is by ensuring that only credible and competent persons get appointed to man any component of our educational institutions.

    “We shall beam our searchlights on the academia to identify individuals that have stood out in providing qualitative services. The current DVC of the Federal University, Oye Ekiti (FUOYE), Prof. Fasina Abayomi Sunday is one of such individuals that has gone full length in ensuring peaceful and conducive atmosphere for teaching and learning.

    “Besides mediating between the Academic Union of Universities (ASUU) and the University management over time has influenced investors to the institution and the University now generates funds for to augment the federal allocations,” the statement explained.

    The CSO added that Prof. Fasina is an example of thinking outside the box and urged the Minister to look out for such personalities that would stop at nothing in proffering solution to challenges.

    The group urged the minister to consider working with him at levels of higher responsibility for the overall good of the educational sector.

  • Video: Watch How Faulty Elevator Crushed Man In New York Building

    (tca/dpa/NAN/FLOWERBUD NEWS) A 30-year-old man was crushed to death by a falling elevator in his luxury apartment building Thursday as passengers watched in horror, officials said.

    Samuel Waisbren rode the elevator down to the lobby of his 23-story apartment building, known as the Manhattan Promenade, at 344 Third Ave. near E. 26th Street with six other residents about 8:30 a.m., but didn’t make it out alive.

    The victim’s devastated father, Dr. Charles Waisbren, made this known to the New York Daily News by phone from his home in Milwaukee on Friday.

    “It’s hard to see how you can go on living when such a big thing is taken from you,” Waisbren said.

    He added: “Sam was an absolutely wonderful young man. Smart and loving and very, very sensitive.

    ”He had his whole life ahead of him.”

    Waisbren started to walk out of the elevator on the heels of another passenger when the lift suddenly plummeted, crushing him, according to officials and a building worker who witnessed the gruesome mishap.

    The passenger, who made it off the elevator spun around and tried to help the trapped victim.

    A worker, who witnessed the horror said, ”The elevator took him down. It’s awful. It was disgusting.”

    The five people who remained on the descending elevator were forced to watch as Waisbren was sucked into the gap between the shaft and the elevator car, officials said.

    “Some people were left on the car after the car moved down to the basement,” FDNY Chief Anthony Arpaia said.

    Waisbren was crushed by the elevator against a shaft wall and died at the scene, authorities said.

    Arpaia said responding firefighters scrambled to remove the five horrified passengers and free the victim.

    “The patient was unfortunately stuck between the first floor and basement.

    “We had to work pretty hard to get the elevator car moved and extract the patient,” Arpaia added.

    Waisbren moved to the city six years ago, relatives said. He worked in sales at software company CB Insights.

    “A Midwest boy goes out to the big city, and dies.

    “It’s just horrible to feel that he’s not going to grow up to have children, to have his own family, progress in his career,” said his father.

    The dad said that his son had complained to his parents about elevator problems in the building.

    One-bedroom units go for 3,600 dollars in the building.

    “My feeling about New York is you pay a bazillion dollars for rent, the least they could do is provide safety,” the victim’s father said.

    The building’s management company, ATA Enterprises, did not return calls for comment.

    The building has 17 past building violations, none of them for elevator issues. But residents said the building’s two elevators have long been an issue.

    “There’s always something wrong with the elevators.

    ”They’re always down, people are getting stuck,” said Dayna Sargen, 39, who’s lived in the building with her husband and two small kids for two years.

    “If I had ever thought that this could happen I would’ve never ever put myself and my family in an elevator.

    “It’s just sad. It’s tragic,” she added.

    City Buildings Department inspectors were investigating how the elevator malfunctioned.

    “Elevators are the safest form of travel in New York, due to the city’s stringent inspection and safety requirements.

    “We’re determined to find out what went wrong at this building and seek ways to prevent incidents like this in the future,” said Buildings Department spokeswoman Abigail Kunitz.

    See the video below: Warning: graphic content

    https://youtu.be/f6e_cpMaUdo

  • FMBN, Diaspora Commission Plan To Providing Easy Mortgage For Abroad

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) is developing  a Diaspora mortgage housing scheme to assist Nigerians living abroad to own homes in Nigeria, the Managing Director, Mr Ahmed Dangiwa, says.

    Dangiwa spoke in Abuja on Thursday when Mrs Abike Dabiri-Erewa, the Chairman of Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, paid him a courtesy visit.

    He described the visit as timely because the bank was currently managing Nigerians in the Diaspora on mortgage products developed for them.

    Dangiwa said that several presentations had been made on the subject at external engagements attended by the bank, particularly in the UK and the U.S.

    He said the bank had received positive responses and visits as a result of some of the engagements.

    “The Diaspora Mortgage is a special window developed for Nigerians living abroad to facilitate access to finance for residential housing development at home.

    “The steps we took show that we have the interest of Nigerians in Diaspora,” Dangiwa said.

    He said that the central focus of the bank’s strategic realignment was to strengthen its partnership and collaborate with stakeholders to promote mutual understanding to  achieve  the purpose of the National Housing Fund (NHF).

    He said that the bank was established to provide affordable mortgages to drive home ownership among Nigerians, particularly low and medium income earners, through NHF.

    Dangiwa said Nigerian workers contributed 2.5 per cent of their monthly income to the NHF scheme.

    In her speech, Dabiri-Erewa said the project would make the lives of Nigerians in Diaspora easier by enabling them to acquire their own houses.

    She said that it would deal with the major challenges faced by Nigerians in Diaspora as many  had been duped by friends and relatives.

    “Many of them will send some money home for people to help them build houses but at the end, those relatives will spend the money without doing anything,” Dabiri-Erewa said.

    She said that Dangiwa had made mortgage attractive as poor Nigerians could now own houses.

    Dabiri-Erewa said it was important that something was done urgently to ensure that Nigerians in Diaspora owned houses in the country.

    She said that the staff of the commission would participate in the bank’s mortgage programme. (NAN)

  • Embrace Organic Fertilizer To Boost Soil Fertility, Official Urges Gombe Farmers

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS)  Ibrahim Sajo, Director of Planning, Research and Statistics, Gombe State Ministry of Agriculture has advised farmers in the state to embrace the use of organic farming to boost soil fertility.

    Sajo gave the advice during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Gombe on Friday.

    According to him, the use of organic fertiliser is key to sustaining the quality of the soil, as the continued use of chemical fertilisers depletes the soil while reducing crop yield over time.

    He said that the use of organic fertiliser and its awareness was increasingly gaining momentum across the globe as a result of the many benefits to the soil and crop.

    “We are encouraging farmers to embrace organic fertiliser use as way of improving the quality of our soil. It is important they do that, so we can protect the soil for the future.

    “Organic fertilisers have been there from time but these chemical fertilisers are more accepted and popular among our farmers because it is easier to apply on plants and the output is seen by farmers.

    “Our extension officers are working to ensure farmers embrace the use of organic fertiliser to encourage soil fertility. Too much chemical has some negative effects on soil and even human health.

    “Organic foods are good for human health and are more of high demand. If our farmers accept the use of organic fertiliser to grow organic food, they will make more money because organic foods are more expensive.

    “We are planning in collaboration with the Agricultural Development Programme (ADP) in the area of enhancing soil health and fertility.
    “The plan is to buy organic fertiliser alongside chemical fertiliser for farmers to cultivate its use.

    “As the organic begins to get acceptance, we will begin the gradual withdrawal of the chemical fertilisers,’’ he said.

    He expressed concern that most farmers were still foot-dragging toward the acceptance of organic fertiliser, adding that in most parts of the world organic fertiliser use was gaining more acceptance.

    “Organic fertiliser is now gaining more attention in most countries because it improves soil structure and preserves essential nutrients that crops need to grow well.

    “Having used chemical fertilisers for a long time, farmers need to buy organic in place of chemical fertilisers to restore soil fertility and get good crop yields and even more money for themselves.

    ’’He stated that the ministry was already linking farmers to experts and markets where farmers could access organic fertilisers, adding that all extension officers were ready to provide any help in that regard.(NAN)

  • Google Disables YouTube Channels For Hong Kong ‘Influence Operation’

    (FLOWERBUD NEWS) Google said it disabled 210 channels from its platform YouTube which uploaded content related to the ongoing pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong in an apparent coordinated influence operation.

    Shane Huntley, director of Google Security’s Threat Analysis Group, said in a blog post that the channels were disabled earlier in the week “when we discovered channels in this network behaved in a coordinated manner while uploading videos related to the ongoing protests in Hong Kong.

    “This discovery was consistent with recent observations and actions related to China announced by Facebook and Twitter.”

    Earlier in the week Twitter and Facebook accused the Chinese government of running a social media campaign to manipulate public opinion against pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong and taking advantage of social media platforms that are banned on the mainland.

    Google said that it found “use of VPNs and other methods to disguise the origin of these accounts and other activity commonly associated with coordinated influence operations”.

    VPNs, or virtual private networks, are often used to circumvent geo-restrictions and censorship.

    Some of the 936 accounts originating from China which Twitter suspended this week saying they were part of a state-backed campaign for allegedly attempting “to sow political discord in Hong Kong” also used VPNs.

    The moves by the social media giants are a rebuke of China’s attempt to shape opinion around the protests, as masses of Hong Kong residents have taken to the streets for weeks against what they say is Beijing’s creeping rule over the semi-autonomous territory. (dpa/NAN)